Yesterday, DailyTech reported that Wal-Mart was preparing to drop the price on Toshiba's 1080i HD-A2 HD DVD player. Images were taken of a Wal-Mart aisle end cap with the HD-A2 listed for $198. According to user who posted the picture online, the new price is to take effect on November 3.

Well, it appears that Circuit City has beaten Wal-Mart to the punch and is currently offering the HD-A2 for $197.99. The player is available online with free shipping or if having the player in your hands right now is a priority, you can choose in-store pickup.

So explain why the vast majority of us who have non 1080p HDTVs should care? I'll surely be able to buy a much nicer and cheaper player in this (or the next) format by the time I buy another TV that supports 1080p (or higher.)

but then again, noobs are causing change in the world. what happens when you upgrade your television to 1080p or something higher )when it comes along(? you may have to upgrade you HD-A2 to a higher resolution model. actually, buying a 1080p model now may save you a little money in the long run.

The "noobs" are those who don't understand that there are differences in an interlaced signal between broadcast video and an HD disc player. A 1080i signal from such a player has the frames synched in the temporal domain, which means it can be bit-identically deinterlaced to the original 1080p signal. No image quality loss whatsoever; just a simple "bob-and-weave" operation.

In fact, all the original "1080p" BD players are doing just that deinterlacing anyway...its' just happening within the player, rather than your TV. The original 1080p source is output as 1080i by the chipset, then reconverted to 1080p just before being ouptut by the player.

The "noobs" are also the ones that assume that just because a 1080i signal can be deinterlaced bit-indentically, that it will be always. For example the current generation of HDTV flat panels have a minority of TVS that actually pass 1080i film resolution loss tests.

> "For example the current generation of HDTV flat panels have a minority of TVS that actually pass 1080i film resolution loss tests"

I'd be interested in seeing that link. Here's a link to loss test between a 1080i source (HD-A2) and a 1080p source (BDP-S300), in which both players scored equally in both film resolution loss and video reconstruction.

In any case, the primary point is such tests are done with reference disks and evaluated by professionals. Your average consumer viewing movies isn't going to see a difference regardless, even if their HDTV "screws up" the deinterlacing. Anyone who says 'I won't buy 1080i' regardless of other factors is being sadly misinformed.

Well, unfortunetly I'm going to lose my mods in this artical to post this... but seriously, downscaling and deinterlacing? You do realize that all HD video is stored in progressive? and all players support 720P? Just so you stay informed, my HD-DVD collection looks much better on my 50" Toshiba 720P TV than upscaled DVDs which are which some times look really nice and other times look like absolutly horrible (particularly with fast movement on screen).